German Unification, Democratization, and The Role of Social Movements: A Missed Opportunity?

1996 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dieter Rucht
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Radical Democracy ◽  
Communist Regime ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
German Unification ◽  
East German ◽  
German Revolution ◽  
Internal And External Factors ◽  
Missed Opportunity

Citizen movements were an important factor in triggering the peaceful East German revolution that abolished the communist regime and contributed to achievement of elementary civil rights that are taken for granted in Western democracies. However, the movements failed in their efforts to resist quick German unification via the largely uncontested transplantation of the West German institutional system to East Germany. This article analyzes why the movements could not achieve their aim of a new political order, in their view superior to Western type democracy—one that would guarantee radical democracy and extensive social rights for citizens. Drawing on three prominent perspectives in social movement research it is argued that both internal and external factors contributed to the failure of these movements. Although they might have avoided some minor tactical errors, they had few prospects for strongly influencing the course and result of German unification. Because this outcome was overdetermined, it is incorrect to suggest that the movements missed an opportunity to achieve their goal of radical democracy.

The German Revolution of 1918/19

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Dillon
Keyword(s):  
Political Transformation ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
German State ◽  
The First World War ◽  
Socialist Government ◽  
German Revolution ◽  
First World ◽  
Missed Opportunity ◽  
The Revolution

The German Revolution of 1918/19 is often viewed as underwhelming and disappointing, as a missed opportunity for social and political transformation which hamstrung the Weimar Republican project. This chapter engages with the revolution in more synchronic terms, as a lived event and a conspicuously successful project of civic mobilization. The German Revolution of 1918/19 fulfilled popular aspirations for political participation which had surged during the First World War. It delivered an armistice, a republic, parliamentary democracy, and the first-ever socialist government of an advanced industrial economy. The chapter traces the origins and course of the revolution, focusing on the agency of crowds and activists who led localized insurgencies across Germany. It explores the role of the council (Räte) movement in localities and at Reich level. The chapter concludes by appraising the counter-revolution of 1919. A series of local uprisings by left-wing radicals gave the MSPD regime and its military accomplices a pretext to push back against social revolution and to demonstrate, through extreme violence, the recovered authority of the German state.

scholarly journals Denying Difference to the Post-Socialist Other: Bernhard Heisig and the Changing Reception of an East German Artist

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 45-74
Author(s):  
April A. Eisman
Keyword(s):  
East Germany ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Eastern Bloc ◽  
German Unification ◽  
Federal Republic Of Germany ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
Before And After ◽  
East German

This article traces the reception of East German artist Bernhard Heisig’s life and art—first in East Germany and then in the Federal Republic of Germany before and after the Wall. Drawing on post-colonial and post-socialist scholarship, it argues that Heisig’s reception exemplifies a western tendency to deny cultural and ideological difference in what the post-socialist scholar Piotr Piotrowski calls the “close Other.” This denial of difference to artists from the eastern bloc has shaped western understandings of Heisig’s life and art since reunification. Once perceived as an intellectually engaged, political artist, both in East and West Germany, after the fall of the Wall and German unification, Heisig was reinterpreted as a traumatized victim of two dictatorships, distorting not only our understanding of the artist and his work, but also of the nature of art and the role of the artist in East Germany.

The CJEU’s case law on the role of posting certificates: A missed opportunity to combat social dumping

2020 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 484-502 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herwig Verschueren
Keyword(s):  
Social Security ◽  
Member State ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Temporary Employment ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
The Social ◽  
And Control ◽  
Missed Opportunity ◽  
The Eu

The posting of workers between Member States of the EU has increased dramatically over the past decade. It has led to political and legal discussions on the employment and social rights of these workers during their temporary employment in the host Member State. As far as social security is concerned, these workers remain subject to the social security system of the sending Member State, provided that a number of conditions are fulfilled. Still, the application of these conditions and control of their observance did not turn out to be efficient and was even rendered problematic by the case law of the CJEU on the meaning of the so-called posting certificates. This article takes a closer look at the role of these certificates. It the analyses and discusses the case law on this and formulates some critical comments on it.

Reemerged Small-Business Capitalism: The East German Transition Reviewed

2000 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 94-118
Author(s):  
Katharina Bluhm
Keyword(s):  
Social Networks ◽  
Planning System ◽  
German Unification ◽  
Top Down ◽  
German State ◽  
East German ◽  
Centralized Planning ◽  
Enterprise Transformation ◽  
Central Actor

Research on the enterprise transformation in East Germany after unification has focused mostly on the role of the Treuhandanstalt as the central actor in this process who widely determined its outcomes. David Stark and László Bruszt (1998) even suggest that this top-down model of transformation was rooted in the special institutional past of East German state socialism. They argue that the “Weberian home-land” was characterized by weak social networks among firms in comparison, for example, with firms in Hungary or Czechoslovakia, while the planning system and the industrial organization were extraordinarily centralized and hierarchical. Hence, social networks could easily be destroyed after German unification by market shock and by breaking up large enterprises into manageable pieces by the Treuhandanstalt. Moreover, the former, intact centralized planning system could easily be replaced by another centralized and cohesive administrative apparatus, now backed by the strong West German state.

Introduction: The East German Revolution, German Unification, and the Left

1990 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 3-8
Author(s):  
Y. Michal Bodemann ◽  
Willfried Spohn
Keyword(s):  
German Unification ◽  
East German ◽  
German Revolution

Perspectives on Resistance with the People

2007 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 144-154
Author(s):  
Ruud van Dijk ◽  
Peter E. Grieder
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Communist Regime ◽  
Popular Resistance ◽  
Eastern Germany ◽  
State Security ◽  
The People ◽  
Role Of The State ◽  
East German ◽  
Set Up

Gary Bruce's volume in the Harvard Cold War Studies Book Series, Resistance with the People: Repression and Resistance in Eastern Germany, 1945–1955, provides an overview of the East German state security apparatus (Stasi) from the mid-1940s, when secret police organs were set up in eastern Germany by the Soviet occupation forces, through the mid-1950s, when the size of the Stasi sharply increased, allowing it to become a massive surveillance and repressive apparatus. Bruce examines the origins of the Stasi, the role of the state security organs in the outbreak and suppression of the East German uprising of June 1953, and the subsequent evolution of the Stasi under Walter Ulbricht, who removed his rivals from the state security apparatus and then reestablished it as a separate ministry responsible for “combatting all internal and external enemies” of the Communist regime. Two prominent experts on East German history offer their perspectives on Bruce's book and the role of popular resistance under Communist rule.

The Purge of Lawyers after the Breakdown of the East German Communist Regime

1995 ◽  
Vol 20 (01) ◽  
pp. 223-243 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erhard Blankenburg
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Republic ◽  
East Germany ◽  
Legal Profession ◽  
Communist Regime ◽  
Federal Republic Of Germany ◽  
The West ◽  
The Core ◽  
East German ◽  
Communist Past

When in East Germany communist rule broke down, West Germans stood ready to take over. The end of communism also meant the end of the German Democratic Republic state; unification came as unconditional surrender to the western Federal Republic of Germany. The purge of the former regime's leaders therefore became intertwined with the West German takeover. With the takeover came Western politicians, managers, and professionals, forcing East Germans to compete fur jobs and influence. Opportunistic strategies with regard to the future buildup thus mixed with the desires for revenge and justice toward those responsible for the communist past. In this article I focus especially on the screening of the East German legal profession for reemployment in the unified Germany. In the West German tradition the legal profession forms the core of the civil services. In communist states lawyers had remained relatively marginal to the center of political power. Thus Western perceptions of the role of law account for the demise of the East German legal profession. That demise is taking place at a time when the Western regime is in need of many more legally trained people than ever worked in East Germany.

State-run celebration of Liberation Day in Czechoslovakia (based on audiovisual sources)

2019 ◽  
pp. 251-268
Author(s):  
Timur Gimadeev
Keyword(s):  
Political Development ◽  
Communist Regime ◽  
Political Regime ◽  
The Political ◽  
Historical Experience ◽  
History Of ◽  
Post War ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Military

The article deals with the history of celebrating the Liberation Day in Czechoslovakia organised by the state. Various aspects of the history of the holiday have been considered with the extensive use of audiovisual documents (materials from Czechoslovak newsreels and TV archives), which allowed for a detailed analysis of the propaganda representation of the holiday. As a result, it has been possible to identify the main stages of the historical evolution of the celebrations of Liberation Day, to discover the close interdependence between these stages and the country’s political development. The establishment of the holiday itself — its concept and the military parade as the main ritual — took place in the first post-war years, simultaneously with the consolidation of the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia. Later, until the end of the 1960s, the celebrations gradually evolved along the political regime, acquiring new ritual forms (ceremonial meetings, and “guards of memory”). In 1968, at the same time as there was an attempt to rethink the entire socialist regime and the historical experience connected with it, an attempt was made to reconstruct Liberation Day. However, political “normalisation” led to the normalisation of the celebration itself, which played an important role in legitimising the Soviet presence in the country. At this stage, the role of ceremonial meetings and “guards of memory” increased, while inventions released in time for 9 May appeared and “May TV” was specially produced. The fall of the Communist regime in 1989 led to the fall of the concept of Liberation Day on 9 May, resulting in changes of the title, date and paradigm of the holiday, which became Victory Day and has been since celebrated on 8 May.

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